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Sunday, February 04, 2018

I moved to the country and started working on a farm and - SHOCKER - I spend less time with a computer.

But I DO spend a lot of time with the cell phone.

And I do still take photos of plants and Jada and the farm and Bubba with chainsaws and me being stung by angry stinging insects..

Plus all that other stuff you've come to know me for and about which we all used to chat enjoyably over our respective beverages from different points on the maps.

Let's do that some more, but just over at Instagram where I post the photos and the swears now.

I may make it back to the blog here and there, but dudes - I'm just going into my first season where I've done the whole crop plan for 1.25MM square feet of greenhouse and I'm going to be photoing the whole fucking lot of it and that'll be over there where it's fast and I can get back to anxious breakdowns between farm catastrophes/thrills.

OK - speaking of catastrophes/thrills - I'm going to go shing the hill now because LO spring is here a lot of months earlier than last year and the weeds are really something.

Monday, July 31, 2017

There has been some serious SHINGing going on around this muther fucker.

And by SHINGing, I mean scything because of the SHING SHING SHINGing it does when I'm slicing oh-so-satisfyingly through acres of 10' tall thistles and the tall grass before it turns into fire bait.

SHINGSHINGSHING

I love it.

Seriously, it is like therapy. Like hillbilly dun lost 'er shit therapy. Our neighbors think we're nuts. And dangerous. Which is really something coming from the likes of these fine armed folks.

The cow horn holster (for the whetstone, obviously) isn't helping.

Anyway - I've been scything. Grass, thistles, wild pea tumbleweeds that are a super pain in the ass to scythe because of the stupid ass way they grow and then get all snarled up and grow giant trunks that are really hard to SHING through.

It's been fairly successful. And despite the physical effort it looks like I'm exerting, it's actually way lighter work than hauling around that weedwhacker. Plus I'm not breathing in gas fumes. Or straining to hear Gojira over the roar of the motor. Or sweating my tits off in coveralls to avoid having grass shot up my pooper.

That shit's a fucking scene, man.

But with the scything I get to ditch the coveralls, groove to whatever French metal I please at a reasonable volume and peacefully SHINGSHINGSHING my way across the hillside.

I mean, until I SHING a yellow jacket nest, of course.

SHINGWHATTHUFUCK?!

Then it's just all scythe-throwing and girlish shrieking and Bubba yelling "WHAT WHAT WHAT??" and me running through the woods at a rate so expeditious that after the Great Yellow Jacket Mauling of 2017 concluded, he tried to comfort me by telling me that he was impressed I could run that fast in work boots.

And this is an OH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO that Bubba can't rescue me from because he's allergic as shit to stingers.

So, yeah, probably not the best and smartest move for me to be hurtling myself down the hillside in his direction looking for help. I realized my error about halfway down the hill, but I was moving at such a speed (see sub-2 hr marathon in work boots) that momentum, gravity and the spacing of the oak trees predetermined my path. A path which dumped me out nearly at his feet. And me waving my arms and shrieking "NO NO NO" didn't deter him from coming to my rescue and then being aggressively shooed away so that I could find and kill those stinging fuckers myself.

ASSHOLES. UGH.

Later, after I came down from the adrenaline and rage from my yellow jacket-fueled run, I inspected the yellow jacket nest from afar.

It seemed ACTIVE.

When I went back the next morning to fetch my scythe, which I'd hurtled to the ground in my hasty escape, I found it laying ever so conveniently across TWO entrances to a massive nest.

Delightful.

Thankfully it was cool out and there wasn't much action on at the nest yet, so I pulled my hoodie up, cinched it down around my face, hiked out there, snatched up my scythe, gave the nest a good old American middle finger (it was 4th of July after all) and marched back to the house.

ASSHOLES. UGH.

And then, because I will NOT have my foggy morning dog walk ruined by the likes of a bunch of asshole yellow jackets, I went downstairs to make tea and go for my walk.

Love fog. LOVEIT.

Except then SUPER FUN fishing a yellow jacket out of my sweatshirt when I sat down to put my shoesonyaythanksforthat.

I'm afraid that one bore the brunt of my rage at his entire nest and species. There was not a lot left of that dude when my boots and I were done with him.

GEEZGODDAMN.

So yeah, scythes are awesome for cutting grass but not good for defense against stinging insects.

Got it.

---------
Update a month later, here. Hi! I'm on vacation yay!

The nest was just raided the other night by another suddenly-a-lot-less-loathed beast of the hillside - a skunk.

At first I was pissed when I woke up to the waft of skunk on the morning breeze but when Bubba told me that HEY AWESOME the nest was busted open and there wasn't any flying going on up there anymore, I became very forgiving with the skunks.

I mean, they are fluffy and cute after all. And wasp hungry.

AVENGE ME, MIGHTY FEARLESS SKUNKS INTIMIDATORS OF ALL PREDATORS!

They know. That's why they walk so slow across the road when I'm driving to work in the early hours.

Monday, May 08, 2017

I had thought that oh yeah I can totally do a post a month, fer sure and then I took on a big old fucking job at the farm and yeah no.
Good thing I only told myself I would post at least once a month and not you guys. Well, until now.

Whatever - HI! It's May! April sucked ass! Work is busy! It's like this for everyone! I'll stop whining.

Instead, I'll just give you guys another reason to think me a big fucking nerd.

I am on vacation next week.

Which is not nerdy.I plan to garden ALL week long.

Which is only vaguely nerdy. At least that's where it registers on my scale of nerdiness.

I chose to take this week off because it follows the plant sale at the college where I got my horticulture degree and this way I can prep for my vacation by buying a shit load of plants for my week of garden nerding.

Which is, like, pretty nerdy, I guess.

Last fall I gave my plant list for the native plant restoration project I'm doing at my house to my program chair from the horticulture department and he had the crop production classes grow out my plant list.

Am I getting warmer? I feel like this is warm nerd territory.

What if I told you that I planned to take this week off last year? Before I even knew that the California native plants of my heart's desire were going to be custom grown for me from a list of my own devising?

THAT WOULD BE NERDY.

I didn't do that. I only decided after the offer was made.

So, I'm only sort of plant nerdy. Like, on a scale of 1-10 where 1 is "What is a California Poppy?" and 10 is "IF YOU DON'T CALL IT ESCHSCHOLZIA CALIFORNICA YOU CAN DIE IN A FIERY HEAP OF FRESH CUPCAKE SHAPED WILD TURKEY SHIT!", I'm probably around a 6.

You know, where 6 is "I will ever so carefully weedwhack around all lacy poppy foliage on 5 acres of hillside in order to spare every last flower so that it may spread its seed far and wide because I love them so so much."

That's my level of nerdiness. I think, anyway.

So, if I live through this week of work, which is always in question until I finally tear off my boots at the end of the week, I will embark on a week of plant nerdiness that, until now, has only existed in my wildest nerd fantasies.

Wanna see the plants I'm getting?

Aesclepias speciosa, California Milkweed

Carpenteria Californica, Bush Anemone

Lupinus arboreus, Bush Lupine

Erigonum grande var. rubescens, Red Buckwheat

Eschscholzia californica, California Poppy

Diplacus aurantiacus, Sticky Monkey Flower

Salvia spathacea, Hummingbird Sage

And also others that I don't have photos of yet. And that the internet won't let me paste into Blogger for some mysterious reason that I don't have the energy to sort out.

So yeah, much gardening will happen in my life next week. I have big fancy plans to buy all the natives at the college plant sale whilst shoving grannies out of the way to get to all of my precious baby plants if I have to. After which, I will spend many days digging holes, planting, mulching and fighting off the deer with my gloved hands.

Because Bubba got a scythe to tame our hillside grass and it works so well and he is so badass that I had to have one, too.

JUST LOOK AT THIS AND TELL ME YOU DON'T WANT ONE.

I won't believe you.

The man cut 1/4 acre of grass and weeds down in 20 minutes.

20 MINUTES.

And he wasn't even out of breath.

So yeah, mine's en route. As is the cow horn whetstone holder because if you're going to use a scythe, why not go for the psycho gold and carry your whetstone in a cow horn?

And also why not wear your black hoodie with the skull and cross bones on the back, with the hood up, and pump French death metal until your neighbors are convinced that Death Herself has moved in next door?

Sunday, March 19, 2017

There's just something about a freshly newly stacked pile of firewood that makes you feel good, right?

I'll never be cold. EVAR.

Not like it's all super fucking cold around here or anything. I mean, it's still Northern California we're talking about here. So, like, in the 30s in February counts for cold.

We're more worried about shit like flooding than extreme cold.

Flood Day it is, then? OK.

We have just the one wee bridge to get out to our property, so when it goes under the otherwise non-existent creek, it's this new thing called Flood Day that's like Snow Day but way less fun.

I imagine. Having only had a handful of Snow Days in my life during my undergrad in Flagstaff, anyway. And really what I remember are things like ill-fated attempts to get up to the local ski hill and then bailing out to the local brewery to hear war stories about snow shoveling, so what do I know of The Fun of Snow Days.

I can say, however, Flood Days are kind of not as fun because they also usually involve repeatedly checking the status of the household mudslide.

"Eh. It's about as big as before. It still looks like Playdoh spaghetti squeezing through the fence rail."

Yippie whippy.

Trillium chloropetalum, Giant Wakerobin

I do really like the between-storm damage patrols, though. Because who doesn't like to walk around in soggy woods with a big poking stick and muck boots?

Don't tell me. I like to believe that I am normal.

This was the first time I'd seen sun in, like, 5 days, so, some forgiveness, ok?

Cabin Fever is a real concern.

Adiantum jordanii, California Maidenhair

Dryopteris arguta, Wood Fern

Fallen Quercus agrifolia, Coast Live Oak

Dryopteris arguta, Wood Fern

I also dragged out an old blanket and Bubba hauled some giant limbs down our gully while picking off dead stuff from all the other oaks before it could fall and cause undue alarm in the night.

I don't really need to wake up to the sounds of I Don't Know What That Was But It Sounded Big falling down around my house while I'm trying to sleep any more than absolutely necessary, is my thing.

I can have a vegetable garden or I can have a goat corral for five days of the year. I went goats. Doy.

As though there are people that DON'T want this on their property.

Also deer.

Deer, cottontails, ground squirrels, jackrabbits, skunks, opossum, rats, field mice...there are a lot of creatures here that love to eat/make a nest of/fuck up a vegetable garden.

Dudes - even the succulents I planted in a pot on the top level of my deck within five feet of Jada The Predator's jaws weren't safe. Something fucking ate them, too.

Sidenote: Name that movie. Hint: That is not a complete quote.

So yeah, despite whatever delusions I may have vaguely entertained when we bought the place of the vegetable garden I *might* have *one day* once we don't need that flat spot for necessary maintenance activities of our main power source and the hungry naughty wildlife has left their native habitat of our property because they decide they want their kids going to the good schools in Los Altos rather than this bumpkin shit (honestly, I have no idea of school systems. I don't have kids. But you get it.) - maybe then.

But until then, no.

And that's totally 100% OK.

Seriously. I'm fine with it.

Because...natives.

California natives and an essentially untouched 5 acre oak woodland that has almost every Sunset Zone 16 exposure imaginable.

And the same house where the previous residents decided to plant vinca and let it run amok in the front and then never did a shitting thing about the poison oak choking out the Coast Live Oak (Quercus agrifolia for my plant nerds! Woo!) in the back and then put in a bunch of tragically tight-spaced non-native water hungry Poplars and surrounded it all, including the oaks, with drip and sprinkler irrigation.

For the win.

Ugh.

But to bring it back. To make it right, plant-wise. That's the fun now.

So, sorry tomatoes, but our field grower is perfectly excellent at growing tangy rich dry farmed Early Girls and drunkeningly luscious heirloom cantaloupe and more frilly perfect dill than I ever knew even existed in a single crop anywhere. And I grow basil and cucumbers year round, so we have that and all the other shit that comes off the farm. So no one needs a vegetable garden then, too.

Do you like the high contrast photo that I took at midday after I discovered the deer had gone to work on my new Ceanothus 'Joyce Coulter'? I don't. It's a shit photo and those deer are jerks but next spring I bet the "after" photo will look incredible.

And maybe one day, when we've cleared enough of the poison oak from the beautiful hillside to put in our little trail, I'll get to go out into the wild (but in a way where I don't meet a tragic end in an abandoned bus) to plant even more because I'M DRUNK WITH THE POWER OF FIVE WHOLE ACRES OF ZONE 16 OAK WOODLAND WOO!

The days where I yard work myself to a near stroke only a few times a year when the vegetable garden goes in/comes out are super over.

Every weekend, folks. Be jealous.

The days where going out to do yard work does not involve a pre-treatment, hooded Tyvek suit, elbow length gloves, full face coverage and an invasively thorough Technu post-treatment hosing off are over, too.

Strange that the gloves are what makes this scary.

These are the salad days for sure.

But - we are making just the tiniest bit of progress with the 5 acres of Bubba-eating poison oak, so there's that.

Before

After

And, while Bubba happens to be violently OFFENSIVELY allergic to poison oak, I happen to not be allergic apparently at all.

And...vomit.

Though I'm sure that now I say that, I'll die of poison oak inhalation or something stupid.

And I think you know that this was finally the moment we were all waiting for - GOATS.

Let me allow that to sink in.

GOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAATTTTTTTTTTTTTSSSSSSSSS

FOR FUCKING FINALLY, RIGHT?

And not because I somehow convincingly demanded it or looked extra pathetic or made some censor-worthy offers to Bubba - oh no.

IT WAS HIS IDEA.

Because of the almost dying twice of poison oak since we moved here less than a year ago.

But yeah - GOATS CAME.

And not just, like, one or two goats. NO, PEOPLE - 402 GOATS WERE AT OUR HOUSE.

And, for a few minutes on our road, and then for 5 munchy munchy days of blissful oak, grass and POISON OAK eating they were on our property doing their adorable, insatiable, bottomless-bellied bests.

I said, "This is the greatest thing I've ever seen" approximately 100 times. Every minute.

After they took the goats away (it was a sad day), we armed ourselves with The Poison Oak Station.

So, yes, this is a repurposed repurposed tool cabinet that some kid made (unsupervised, I'm thinking) in shop class that Bubba bought and cut up and welded back together to be the FrankenSmoker and then cut up again and then here we are.

Now it's, luxuriously I might add, lined with cardboard and filled with everything we need to almost hopefully probably if we're really careful not get poison oak while we use the Not Fucking Around tools to, basically, go to battle.

I mean, what even is this thing?

Brush ax. Kaiser blade. Sling blade. Take your pick.

We call it the Dothraki Death Blade because - I mean you can see why. It's kind of like a scythe crossed with a giant machete and bolted onto an ax handle.

And it FUCKING WORKS. For chopping shit back anyway. That's its main purpose. And we have a lot of chopping shit back to do. So, that's one tool we can't do without.

Then there's the super long tree saw with the hookey-loo that can snag the poison oak vines BECAUSE OF COURSE THEY ARE VINING and drag their oily asses out of the beautiful coast live oak trees and into the trailer BOOM. And then saw down the big fat trunks choking the shit out of the trees.

Except don't tell Bubba I called it a hookey-loo. I think he takes offense to the goofball names I apply to all his manly stuff.

And then there's the chainsaw to which Bubba has pledged his eternal soul.

Now, to be clear, we do not use the chainsaw on poison oak - that'd be crazy and would just spray noxious poison oak bits and blobs every old where. But we are also limbing up the trees and cutting up fallen limbs every other foot fall as we creep ever closer to the center of this property, so the chainsaw is a must.

And the trailer. He's a good boy.

And you may not think of it as a super Not Fucking Around Tool - but the rake is in there, too. The ratty old one that the former owners left behind. He can pull great wads of filthy poison oak down around your ankles in no time at all.

Makes me itchy just thinking about it. And I don't even get poison oak! Or do I...?